SCS Building Spreadsheet

[soldyne]

I am working on a spreadsheet that will list all the buildings in the game and all of their properties. I am also including things like efficiency of power buildings, efficiency of workplaces and homes, as well as listing all the actions, abilities, requirements and special sims for each building.

would anyone be interested in said spreadsheet when it is done? I think I can post it here for people to dl.

I am finding it very useful for my own purposes in order to plan ahead for strategy mode (finding the most efficient homes and workplaces). since it is a spreadsheet you can sort, search and filter on any aspect of any building. and of course I plan on updating it for new patches and expansions.

The spreadsheet is complete. let me know what you think. This will continue to be updated based on patches, expansions and of course user feedback.

the download is a .rar compressed file of a windows excel (.xls) spreadsheet. you are free to customize it however you like once you download it. you may also distribute it to others but only if you give me full credit for the original compilation.

For general questions and discussion please continue to use this thread.

version 1.0 - this is the first release of the spreadsheet. contains listing of all power plants, homes, workplaces, decorations and venues. includes calculations for efficiency to help plan for strategic mode. also inlcudes listing of actions, abilities, special sims and buyable items.

version 1.1 - this is the second release. contains a fixed efficiency equation for workplaces (was calculating income incorrectly) also includes some typo fixes.

version 1.2 - this is the third release. contains new tab to list each buildings weight towards each of the profiles. also includes information for strategic mode (upkeep costs and buildings with no and low upkeep) and includes improved efficiency formulas to account for upkeep in strategic mode.

version 1.3 - updated for game update 4. 2 new workplaces, 2 new venues, 1 new ability and 1 new action.

version 2.0 - Updated for game update 5. nearly every workplace was altered by this patch for income and cost. also many abilities were updated as well as some homes, venues, decorations and power buildings. I also updated the efficiency ratings and included columns that calculate the daily maintanence costs for each building by its upkeep level and strategic mode. there is also a new tab which lists what maintenance catagory each building is in. I also fixed a few spelling errors here and there. I also added some columns in the workplace section which show the weekly net profit per workplace which takes into account the maximum income per week, daily maintenance costs and any special abilities which give bonus cash.

[smjjames]

there is one in the primas guide, however the labels were messed up for the society labels, but it is pretty much accurate. Still, a spreadsheet that is more carefully labelled would be nice. Even though I did correct the society labels on the primas guide that I have.

Still, having one that is better organized as far as information goes would be great.

[PantherX]

Yeah, I would like to look at it just for fun. I usually build for a reward or for a specific personal goal/theme. Nightmare mode is still waiting for me so it may be extremely useful

[soldyne]

ah yes the prima guide. can your prima guide sort the entries for you? can you filter it based on any criteria you choose? can you ask your prima guide to search for a specific building or ability? was you prima guide free? will Prima update your guide when patch 3 or the expansion is released? can you send Prima an email and tell them about errors in their guide? will they care if you do?

I think it is safe to say that any electronic spreadsheet created by anyone who cares about the game > than any hard copy you can buy in a store from a company who's greatest concern is making profit.

yeah I know all about prima guides and stopped buying them when I discovered Gamefaqs.com. free strategy guides written by people who know what they are talking about...and now, I just write my own guides!

sorry about all that...I just have this thing against Prima. they used to be good, but, then for a while it seemed like their books were just so shallow and riddled with errors (typos, inaccuracies, lies). also the Prima guides rarely actually talk about strategy or tell you anything other than what you can find out for yourself in the game. they never really explain anything or discuss any actual strategy. most hard copy guides I have seen lately just dont seem to be worth the paper they are printed on. its like the people who wrote them never really played the game...

[smjjames]

Originally Posted by soldyne

ah yes the prima guide. can your prima guide sort the entries for you? can you filter it based on any criteria you choose? can you ask your prima guide to search for a specific building or ability? was you prima guide free? will Prima update your guide when patch 3 or the expansion is released? can you send Prima an email and tell them about errors in their guide? will they care if you do?

I think it is safe to say that any electronic spreadsheet created by anyone who cares about the game > than any hard copy you can buy in a store from a company who's greatest concern is making profit.

yeah I know all about prima guides and stopped buying them when I discovered Gamefaqs.com. free strategy guides written by people who know what they are talking about...and now, I just write my own guides!

sorry about all that...I just have this thing against Prima. they used to be good, but, then for a while it seemed like their books were just so shallow and riddled with errors (typos, inaccuracies, lies). also the Prima guides rarely actually talk about strategy or tell you anything other than what you can find out for yourself in the game. they never really explain anything or discuss any actual strategy. most hard copy guides I have seen lately just dont seem to be worth the paper they are printed on. its like the people who wrote them never really played the game...

yea, I got the primas guide along with the game for christmas, so....

I know all about the primas guide going out of date quickly with computer games, espcially MMORPGS. I got one for Star Wars Galaxies, which did help me start out, but it quickly became outdated.

I never buy Primas guides for computer games (although ones for console games such as xbox are ok since you can't patch up those) because they just go out of date too quickly. So I use online guides instead. So I completely understand what you are saying.

Besides, player created guides are usually much more detailed. Especially when it comes to specific things like player builds, or specific strategies, or even bestiaries.

[soldyne]

thats cool, I did not want you to think I was picking on you

I have all the workplace power supplies figured out now and have the first 40 venues completed. all I have left to do is about 120 more venues and it will be ready for its first upload!

I have the following calculations figured into the spreadsheet:
Power building Efficiency = Power Output / Cost (expressed as a percentage)

House Efficiency (2 calculations)
Cost / Workers
Pop / Workers

Workplace Efficency (2 Calculations)
Income / Workers
Income * Days open per week (weekly income potential)

Venue Efficency = (Capacity*Hours*Happiness)/Cost (expressed as a percentage)

No Calculations for Decorations

I also detail all the building actions, abilities, sellable items, and special sims.

are there any requests for other calculations or lists?

[soldyne]

sorry to double post but I just wanted everyone to know that the spreadsheet is available for download (see the first post). let me know what you think and post your feedback here.

[ADJB]

Worksheet - Workplaces. Column Weekly Income

Can you explain what these figures are and how you have arrived at them please.

The weekly income from my workplaces even with multiple bonus buildings and ecstatic workers is a small fraction of these numbers.

[Primetime01969]

A few observations:

The workplace income (Column I) should be G*H and should be weekly income. U should be removed. U is a big mistake as you are multiplying weekly income (I) by days. That's why it is way too high.

The "sick" ability is actually called "unhealthy" in the game

House Efficiency is calculated as = (Workers + Happiness + (Population/10)) / (Power + (Cost/100))

Workplace Efficiency = ((Days* Income)/Workers) / (Power + (Cost/100))
Venue Efficiency = (Capacity*Happiness*Hours) / (Power + (Cost/100))

[ADJB]

Is it worth including the profile skewing information for buildings to help people plan profiles a bit easier?.

Worksheet - Workplaces. 17,K - Spelling

It would be handy if the all the costs (both $ and sociatal outlays/incomes) were listed for all buildings even if its not used in any calculation.

Although it would be difficult the building effect range would be very useful.

[smjjames]

well, the society numbers that they give should be an easy one, it's listed in several xml files in the SC5 directory, I forget the name, but should be easy to find with some looking around.

Although there are apparently a few that don't have positive or negative society type modifiers at all, namely the Hydrogen Power plant and the sales and loans building. I don't know whether the game sets those to all 0 or 1 by default, but doesn't really matter.

[soldyne]

OMG! for some reason I thought the income on the card was daily income! I have corrected my calculations to reflect Daily Income per Worker. as:
(Weekly Income/(Workers*Days))

I have corrected my typos in the appendix and the workplaces section.

I can add the societal wieghts(profile skewing) but that will take a day or two. lots of buildings.
I am also going to add in information about all the buildings which have no or low upkeep in strategic mode. There are not many but it does help to know them.

on a different note, I was able to get the jack of all trades trophy on hardcore today. I learned a lot about the game.

thanks for the input, keep it comming.

[bdejong11129]

Thank you so much for this. Being a new user it is a great help just to read through and get a handle on what everything does. Now, instead of relentless hovering over every item in the selection, I just sort and pick.


Thanks for the time and effort this took.

[soldyne]

You are quite welcome and welcome to the forums. if you have any suggestions just post them here.

[soldyne]

version 2.0 is live and ready to help you conquer those strategic modes. see the patch updates in the first post. as always if you have some info to share or want to comment on the guide post it here.

[Sandra Linkletter]

Thank you very much for this spreadsheet. I am building a powerless community and I was finding out the hard way which buildings I can use. It is so nice to sort the data on power, then cut-n-paste the zero power building names into notepad where I can look at them while I am building.

[soldyne]

I am very happy that you have found a use for the spreadsheet. if you find any problems with it let me know.

I do not have destinations yet,I am waiting for the SIMCITY Box to come down in price. I feel that I can spend about $20-30 on the Box and it will be like spending that money on the expansion itself. I am really not a big fan of download only games, I like to have a hardcopy around for when my machine needs to be reformatted.

the point of that was to say that I will update the spreadsheet for destinations when I get the expansion.

[Azeem]

I am really not a big fan of download only games, I like to have a hardcopy around for when my machine needs to be reformatted.

You can burn a copy of your direct download onto a CD once you've downloaded it.

[TEP]

soldyne,
This is absolutely utterly completely brilliant! Thank you so much!

Shouldn't this be stickied in the forum so people can always find it? Anyone?

[MidrealmDM70]

Originally Posted by soldyne

I am working on a spreadsheet that will list all the buildings in the game and all of their properties. I am also including things like efficiency of power buildings, efficiency of workplaces and homes, as well as listing all the actions, abilities, requirements and special sims for each building.

would anyone be interested in said spreadsheet when it is done? I think I can post it here for people to dl.

This looks like a useful tool for me as well, I've always worried that when creating a modded building that I will make the cost too low (or high).
With this I can compare its effeicency rating to other buildings to determine a base cost,

Thanks for all the effort!